I haven't posted for almost a week now because I was in the southernmost city in Israel: Eilat. It is located in most Northern part of the Red Sea, and ends at the border with Sinai. Scuba diving and sleeping on the beach with the desert wind on your face is always a blast. Also you get to wake up to this:

What you're seeing is Aqaba in Jordan (though the fog and the fact the sun is directly behind the mountains is why you can't see any buildings) and probably somewhere there's also the border with Saudi Arabia. This was around 6 a.m. Not the worst view in the world.

Eilat itself though is really a dreadful city. Disgusting and dirty. So if you ever go to the Red Sea desert, either go to Sinai or to Aqaba or Saudi Arabia. If you want to go to Eilat stay away from the city itself and keep it to the coast line. I'm sorry I just hate that city with a fiery passion.

But anyway back to music!!

So anyway being in the desert for 4 days I had to hear some very desert-y style music. Dry distortion, dissonance, Arab scales. And what country says desert better than... Norway.....

This honestly more or less the only good official picture I could find of the band. It's pretty epic nonetheless.

They've just released a new album which I bought about a month ago and am yet to give it a proper listen. Instead I have been coming back to their masterpiece debut "Carheart" again and again and again until it has finally sunk in. The songs aren't that insanely complex, but have such a creepy atmosphere to them that it keeps attracting you back and listening to every tiny detail. When I finally conquered it I found myself with an album that would stay with me long after every listen.

The band can't be categorized. The only tag I could tag it is "Metal" but that to isn't completely true. It's a unique sound, though it feels almost cozy and recognizable, until it stabs me in the back.

It's almost I guess post-metal I would call it. The heavy and eerie guitar sounds slapped to yo face by Czarl (that's his stage name I suppose) is just as much there at times to build the atmosphere as it is to give the song melody. The fact that his guitar is in drop-C tuning also really, really, adds to the heaviness. The bass by Plenum is what actually drives the songs forward. A lot of spastic lines at times, upbeat at other times keep this album from sinking in complete mellowness. The drumming is so dry... not in a bad way. More like literally dry. Lots of this very tight snare sound, crisp ride cymbals and such.

In the end you have the feeling as if you're a hermit in the middle of the Saharan Desert trying to cope with not completely losing it.

The vocals are also some of the best I've heard. Czarl sound like a freaky biblical prophet, and provides such classic lines such as "my armor is sticky/ with the semen of god"- pretty freaking cool...

Have ye some listens:

Probably my favorite or one of my favorite finds in 2011. I'll probably talk about their new album sometime in the future.

I used to listen to Virus a lot, but their new album sounds exactly like the previous 2 and got kind of boring. Their rhythm section is pretty sweet, though.

hm yeah I'm yet to listen to the second album, but listening to the third I can't say I hear much progression, though the tracks are at times more upbeat than anything on "Carheart". I still enjoyed it, I have to give it more listens.

Haven't really posted much on these forums yet, but I randomly checked out your blog today and just wanted to say thanks! I've liked all of the bands you've posted so far, especially Three Trapped Tigers. Pretty sure I've heard La Dispute before, but never really took note of them. I'm probably alone on this, but I rather like post-hardcore and even hardcore, though it's one of the genres that is practically the polar opposite of prog.

^ Thanks! Very much appreciated. I don't think that hardcore is necessarily polar opposite of prog. Prog can have hardcore elements (check out NoMeansNo to see what I'm talking about) and Prog can have hardcore moments (honestly to many bands I like have these elements. Try Uz Jsme Doma, Cardiacs, Spratleys Japs bla blaa bla). I rather like hardcore myself, only screamo is a bit of turn-off until I heard La Dispute.

I haven't posted a new band for almost a week because I'm gonna do a big post now featuring two very lovely bands who performed a show yesterday the 27th in the OzenBar- the venue that is owned by Tel Aviv's (possibly best) CD store- The Third Ear (Ozen is ear in Hebrew so that's why the venue's called what it's called).

The first band is undoubtedly the coolest Israeli band today and possibly ever: Kruzenshtern & Parohod!!!!

Look at their beautiful faces!!!!

They are what could be called... Klezmer-hardcore-death-jazz-oriental rock. f**k yeah. Every time they have a show is a sign for mass celebration (the mass being about 50 people...) to rejoice with wonderful experimental music and compliment each other on their T-shirts of some obscure band ("Residents T-Shirt, right on man! *epic freeze frame high five*). They have one of the weirdest most entertaining and hilarious shows around. The band's bassist and main composer Igor Krutogolov (the one on the left) plays like a drunk Russian 5,000 year old dragon being released from its cage.

Observe some epic faces from yesterday's show (sorry for the crappy quality the camera sucks and I'm a terribly photographer):

Epic faces observed? Good!

The band hasn't released any new album since 2004's "Songs" (which is very recommended if you like being a good person), but the band has plenty of new material which it's currently playing in shows. As good as the early first two albums are, the new material sounds GODLY. A lot of the new stuff features much heavier blast beats and funky klezmer and there's not one song where I explode from laughter just from the sheer joyous weirdness. There's one part in the show where Igor rocked too hard (and was probably somewhat drunk) and he just sorta tripped backwards into the crowd (your's truly almost got a bass to the face), and continued playing from the crowd. Eventually when the band went into this weird improv he went into the middle of the crowd, and played this simple groove just over and over. I would've taken a pic but the flash would've completely ruined the epicness. Eventually he just started singing (like he always does) in this eccentric gibberish. It was so hilarious yet so powerful. One of the most memorable moments I had from any gig.

Overall K&P did what they always do. BE. f**kING. AWESOME. Every time they play a show I get excited.

And now some snippets of them (just for you <3) from youtube. Honestly they don't really do justice to how good this gig was, but they're still awesome vids:

This last one is a great quality vid of their joint show with French avant-freak-math-folk rock duo Vialka. That was truly one of the best gigs ever!!!

I added them to PA several years back; a hectic and tireless bunch playing high energy and frenetic music (though I heard some people doubt usage of that word with regards to this group). I have
The Craft Of The Primitive Klezmer and
Songs though it's been a while since I've last spun them. But thanks for featuring them, they deserve the exposure and attention.

Yeah I though to split up the posts on the two bands just for it to be less clunky.

Second band! One that has made a comeback in my music library to become one of the top played in the last few months. I'm talking of the Czech Uz Jsme Doma!!!!

This band's been around for 27 years. Started to play While the Czech Republic was still Czechoslovakia and the Communist regime banned most rock bands, and so they played many secret shows until the fall of Eastern European Communism. They are I guess in essence a punk band with many freaky proggy elements. The also have these awesome Gregorian chanting style vocals at many places and it's always a treat. I think this is their first time in Israel, and with addition to the Tel Aviv show they're also playing in Haifa and Jerusalem (shows unfortunately I probably won't make considering there's no public transportation in most Israeli cities during the Shabbat... Damn). I was really excited about this show and even the late time couldn't dumb down my expectations.

The band started out with one of the songs from their 2010 album "Caves" (I'm not gonna use the Czech names just because I can hardly remember how to pronounce their first name), and with the first song the crowd all of a sudden became half-Czech and I was hearing Czech all over the place. Honestly there's something very Czech in Uz Jsme Doma that makes me also curious about the Czech culture as well as the music.

The sound was a little off in the first songs but it really picked up after the 3rd songs. The guys looked like they were enjoying themselves!

The guys played absolutely fabulous, particularly the drummer and the bassist, who were just on freaking fire. The band went through most of their songs off of "Caves", which really is a great album. They also did the "classic" (well sort of a classic) "Jassica", which more or less only me and my brother knew the actual melody to from the crowd and sang along. Come to think about it I think me and my brother were the only ones who knew anything about Uz Jsme Doma it seems from the crowd, even the Czech crowd didn't seem to go "wooooooooooooh" when some kind of well known song was played.

By the time show was over I was extremely pleased with the whole night and considering the late time I was also tired as hell. I went over to Miloslav Wanek (the singer and guitarist) thanked him for an awesome show, shaked his incredibly sweaty hand (wow... I didn't know a person was capable of sweating so much) and went off my way home.

Check out some Uz Jsme Doma:

It was a wonderful night and I want to thank both bands for being nice people and awesome musicians. The progressive scene is alive and well :).

I added them to PA several years back; a hectic and tireless bunch playing high energy and frenetic music (though I heard some people doubt usage of that word with regards to this group). I have
The Craft Of The Primitive Klezmer and
Songs though it's been a while since I've last spun them. But thanks for featuring them, they deserve the exposure and attention.

No problem! They're just too good it's a shame no one really knows of their existence. Is it prog? Um debatable. But it's really some of the most unique stuff there is out there, and so for that alone they worthy of laudation.

So I didn't post this week at all honestly because I was actually thinking whether or not I should share this group. But f**k it I'm doing it!

In my epic quest to find hip-hop I can enjoy, this one group has shown it's beautiful face to me: them call "Death Grips"!!

Quite honestly some of the strangest most awesome sh*t I've come across in a while! I'm legitimately very excited to listen to this thing over and over and over again!!!! The only one group member whose name is actually said is drummer is Zach Hill (who you might now if you're into spazz-core style stuff. He was in bands like Hella and other insane ohzphzdpojhazdpgadf math rock. It's not easy stuff at all but some of it is worth checking out). There aren't really any drums on this record though, so I guess Zach was just producing or arranging what is essentially a mix-tape.

The group is displays a demented, dark style, spastic, crazy style of hip-hop. The rapper more or less screams the lyrics the whole way through. When I first heard him scream "I AM THE BEAST I WORSHIP" in the first song "Beware" (which by the way, starts with a sample of Charles Manson) I knew I finally found hip-hop that I can not only like and respect, but really love and delve myself into. There are many insane samples on this, like Arthur Brown's "Fire", or Pink Floyd's "Astronomy Domine", or Black Flag samples and stuff like that. The beats are always these incredibly intense, dense, glitchy, grooves which make you move in the most messed up ways (ever danced the "crack-addict-waffle"? I think it's time you learned the moves).

If it's a blog I have no problem with throwing in a little politics with your discussion on regional music.

First time I read this blog! Nice! (specially the Kruzenshtern & Parohod!)

Based on what Slarti said I'll do something a bit dangerous...lets see what happens... Frank Zappa once said, "Never discuss politics in a disco environment".... what about a prog one?

Two great Israeli Prog bands... one new and one classic!

Eggroll with Foe:

and the excellent Prog ballad The Little Prince by Ktzat Acheret (beautiful lyrics by controversial Israeli poet Yonathan Geffen -also father of Aviv Geffen, also controversial singer-songwriter and one half of Balckfield- any of our Israeli friends willing to translate? I am not a very good translator...):

You cannot post new topics in this forumYou cannot reply to topics in this forumYou cannot delete your posts in this forumYou cannot edit your posts in this forumYou cannot create polls in this forumYou cannot vote in polls in this forum